Talking farming opportunities, challenges at Wooster conference

By STEVEN F. HUSZAIStaff WriterPublished: February 23, 2013 4:00AM

WOOSTER -- "In the past, if you took care of your cows and crops you made money," Gary Sipiorski told a group of dairy farmers at a conference about the industry's future and economics. "Now, you've got to know the numbers."

The conference, sponsored by First National Bank and CBI, was held recently at Memories Party and Conference Center. Sipiorski, who was the featured speaker, is a dairy development manager with Vita Plus, an employee-owned financial management company that helps farmers with the complex, and sometimes confusing, financials of farms. He hails from Wisconsin and worked with Citizens State Bank of Loyal, where he worked his way up to CEO. He also served on the advisory committee on agriculture and industry for the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

He is a regular contributor to Hoard's Dairyman, and other agricultural publications. One of his recent Hoard's articles explaining the key financial indicators any dairy farmer should know was at the center of his discussion with local farmers.

Sipiorski discussed national and international trends and issues.

He touched on issues, such as the farm bill extension, understanding emerging markets and where their food comes from, when and what to pay for real estate, and ways to figure out a dairy farm's expenses to understand where to invest a farm's money.

Other challenges about attracting quality workers, succession planning, and understanding what lenders look for when they lend to farmers were other topics discussed in the daylong conference.

Sipiorski noted with statistics how growing countries, mainly in Asia, need to import vast amounts of their food supply in order to feed their residents. For instance, he pointed out Japan needs to import half of its food supply.

"Anybody see opportunity here?" Sipiorski said.

He also pointed out that while milk consumption is down since 1980, cheese consumption has increased and yogurt consumption has exploded over those same time periods. Meanwhile, on the west coast, Sipiorski noted many dairy farmers are going under and sending more of their cows to slaughter, thereby putting a greater demand on Midwest farmers.

Sipiorski challenged farmers in the room to "be a top third producer," by also understanding how much a dairy farm costs to operate on a per acre basis and even a per cow basis.

"A top third producer only does things 5 percent better," he said.

Elmer Baer, a Marshallville area dairy farmer in the audience, said his farm has had a good year, but also remains cautious because of volatile feed prices, especially in light of unpredictable weather.

"The drought didn't affect us too much because we had some feed left over from the year before," Baer explained. "But like (Sipiorski) said, we've got to do 5 percent more."

Despite all the challenges facing the economy as a whole and the dairy market, Sipiorski reiterated, "There is a really great future in dairy," to those in the audience on the production and lending side. "It's a hungry world out there," he said, presenting a figure that the world will need to produce 75 percent more food by 2050. "There's great opportunity in this business."

Reporter Steve Huszai can be reached at 330-287-1645 or shuszai@the-daily-record.com. He is @GeneralSmithie on Twitter.